Crown of Faeries

7 | Acquiesce

A single beam of blue light caressed my face around midnight. My eyes fluttered open and my hands went up to block the light. A whisper of a boyish laugh graced my ears and I propped myself up on my elbow. The bed sunk further in place as the sound of my door scrapping the floor became louder.

I took in a quick and deep breath as the outline of a young boy stepped through the hallway. The light was coming from him, I realized as I dropped my hand. His thin, naked, body iridescent and his eyes so haunting and beautiful at the same time. Their endless shifting colors of blue and white faded in and out as his head tilted to the side in curiosity. The light he gave off tickled my skin as it reached out in small hands to stroke my hair and rub my cheeks in a fatherly manner.

I pressed my face, with a soft purr from my chest, into the light and felt it consume me. I gasped in a short breath as the hands were quickly drawn away. All angles of my body felt cold as the boys amicable face glossed over my own.

"Who--who are you?" I stuttered as a chill ran up and down my spine.

To my amazement, the boys cheeks and sides of his neck peeled forward in a wave of detachable skin that looked similar to gills as they rippled back and forth. The boy opened his mouth and let out a mumble of small screeches. I clasped my hands over my ears as the sounds of his pitched tone of voice caused my ears to bleed.

I looked at the boy with worry, afraid he was here to kill me, but then he stopped speaking and those ear-like flaps of multiple ridged gills folded back into place and their luminescent colors of lavender and magenta faded away to leave the persistent baby blue glow around the boy.

I let my hands move slowly away from my ears then. The boys eyes dropped to my hands, which now laid on my lap, and he took three strides forward before coming to an abrupt stop.

His long and bony fingers reached out and dipped their tips in the small pool of blood in each of my palms. When the blood touched his cool skin, the boy jumped back in fright, shaking his head.

My legs swung over the beds edge as the boy stumbled back towards the door. "Wait!" I called. But the boy wouldn't listen. He still had his head shaking side to side and his face was in a deep pout that twisted his young looking face. His knees shook with each treacherous step he took backwards towards the hall. "Wait," I called out again, this time shoving the sheets away and walking up to him. "Don't leave me." I pleaded.

But when I reached out to embrace the crying young boy, his lips parted and in a sound of cracking rocks and orbiting skies he said, "I never meant to hurt you." And, then he  disappeared into thin air.

I stood there in shock for a moment. My body was slightly bent forward and my hands still out reached to touch the young boy, but he was gone now and I was alone once again.

I wondered what kind of trick this was. Was this Lucien's doing? Was he trying to send me a message? And, if so, what did a small boy have anything to do with me?

I stared into the open hallway as I straightened myself back up. The door completely ajar, I could see the faintest whisper of a candle light flickering somewhere off in the shadows.

As if in a haze, my foot stepped forward and caused the steel floor to sting my toes as I slowly applied pressure. A winter breeze wafted through the air and my skin prickled and small bumps slithered their way to the surface.

I could see my breath dangling in front of me, twisting and weaving its way forward and then in all directions as my back shuddered and my shoulders rolled forward as the shock of something intangible slammed me forward.

I yelped a quick gasp.

My body seemed to split in half. My whereabouts changing from the pitch black hallway to an area full of trickling white. My eyelashes caught in the soft white as the feeling of my soul crashed back into my chest. I shriveled where I laid on my back as the peeling white light turned into something I was not all that familiar with.